Last year, as part of a Heroes, Gods and Monster unit, my Form I class developed their own version of a (great) game called Star Realms. It was terrific fun and the students learnt a lot about Greco-Roman mythology, I will be beginning this same unit again next week with this year’s Form I students. This time, however, we will be taking things a step further - by writing the text of the cards in Latin.

I will post here the introductory letter that I will be giving to the students. I should stress that I have not sought permission from White Wizard Games, although I will be sending them a copy once we finish. I hope they like it...

salvete discipuli,

As part of our study of Gods, Heroes and Monsters, we will be developing a CARD GAME called Sacred Realms. To help us, and to ensure that the game is fun to play, we will base our game closely on an existing game, Star Realms by White Wizard Games.

Star Realms contains cards in 4 factions. These are Trade Federation, The Blob, Star Empire and Machine Cult. Each faction has special abilities. Machine Cult, exempli gratia, is able to remove weaker cards from your deck to make your deck stronger.

We will be making our own cards, replacing Space Ships with Gods, Heroes and Monsters. Our cards will still have the same statistics - they will deal the same damage, heal the same damage, and supply the same currency for buying new cards - but they will be themed differently, with new names, new pictures and new descriptions.

We will begin by renaming the factions, as follows;

Trade Federation will become Goddesses.

The Blob will become Heroes and Demi-Gods

Star Empire will become Godsand

Machine Cult will become Monsters and The Underworld

Our class will be divided into four groups, with each group responsible for one faction. It will be up to you, working in groups, to determine how to rename each card. For example, one of the most powerful cards of the Star Empire is The Dreadnaught, so this might be a good choice for Jupiter. After all, it would make little sense to make a very weak card, such as the Imperial Fighter, the King of Gods and all Humankind!

Once this has been decided, your group will divide again, with each sub-group being responsible for producing one half of your group’s cards. Producing a card will mean 1) finding an appropriate image and 2) writing appropriate text. You will be excited to learn that this text - a short description of the character on your card - will be written in Latin. You will get plenty of help with this, to ensure that your Latin is correct and easy to read.

Magister Gibbins

Ravena enters. I know who has your suitcase,’ Monas declares immediately. ‘Marcellus has it. He is an excellent painter who lives in the attic-room above the restaurant.’